Terror spreads as govt sleeps
The News Review:
- Terror spreads as govt sleeps
- Mobile carriers seek new revenue channels as voice income falls
- Miguel Molina: Imported talent can raise swimming standards
- Chinese cars more popular in Middle East, North Africa
- Bordow: ASU would like to emulate Texas
- Over-the-counter DNA home-test kits have hit the market
Terror spreads as govt sleeps
Deccan Herald - Dec 26, 2007
A weak leadership with very little vision beyond the five-year tenures does not help the situation, which demands a dispassionate and long-term anti-terrorist drive, not limited to winning elections. A national policy approved by all political parties would have made it immune to the criticism of vested interests. Homegrown cells
The ‘home-grown terrorism’ in the country has often been ignored for the fear of political fall-out with ad-hoc and half-baked measures making little impact on the ‘sleeping cells’ that have grown rapidly, particularly in Uttar Pradesh (UP), the largest populated state in the country. These are terrorist elements which have evolved and entrenched themselves, independent of foreign terrorist outfits or their promoters like ISI, LeT (Lakshar-e-Toiba), JeM (Jaish-e-Mohammad), or HUJI. The support to the home-based terrorist have come from the throwbacks in the religious institutions. On November 23 this year, five near-simultaneous bomb blasts hit Varanasi, Lucknow and Faizabad in UP, killing at least 15 people — mostly lawyers — and injuring more than 80 others. Those who claimed responsibility of the blasts described themselves as locals who were reportedly peeved with lawyers for not providing legal help to the suspected JeM terrorists caught by police in Lucknow with an alleged plot to abduct Congress MP Rahul Gandhi.
Mobile carriers seek new revenue channels as voice income falls
China Economic Net - Dec 26, 2007
It is a dilemma for the industry regulator and it will take at least 18 months to complete the industry restructuring. On the other hand, the fixed-line carriers are facing a continued fall in users, and they should get a mobile network immediately, Xi Guohua, vice minister at the MII, was quoted by media reports. Talking about 3G, the home-grown TD-SCDMA obviously needs more time to be commercially mature. But widescale construction of the TD-SCDMA networks hasn’t even started. Industry officials said that before restructuring can start and the advent of 3G, unreasonable policies, such as roaming fees, should be eliminated. The roaming fees, imposed on users who make intracity-mobile calls, are expected to be dropped next year. The policy on free incoming calls will be kept as it popular, according to the regulator.
Miguel Molina: Imported talent can raise swimming standards
Manila Standard Today - Dec 26, 2007
It has opened up a quiet debate about how far can a national sports
association tap foreign-based athletes, but Molina doesn’t shirk
from this issue. “I believe that instead of finding an easy way of getting results,
there needs to be a grassroots program. In swimming, it is true that
the great home grown talent have left, like Marichi Gandionco and Ryan
Arabejo for greener pastures in the US, where the training is the best,”
said Molina. Molina explains that “it’s quite hard to train at a high
level here in Manila because of the time it takes just traveling. ”
“The traffic is terrible and swimmers need to wake up sometimes
before 5 a. to get to work out for an hour or two before school at
7 or 8… It is similar
to outsourcing jobs. However, one difference is that swimming is a sport. The essence of sports is to promote competition, so those home grown,
though it may be tough with the circumstances, need to use this ‘outsourcing’
of imported talent as a challenge to help them improve in swimming,”
he explained. A graduate in international relations from University of California-Berkeley,
Molina has been based in Los Angeles, where plans to return after holidays
to prepare for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. With the super-strong opposition, there is a faint hope for a medal
from the six Philippine tankers, who have qualified for Beijing. But
Molina is level-headed enough to set a reasonable goal. “It would be great if I could reach the semifinals [in Beijing],
but I need to focus on just dropping time first,” said Molina.
Chinese cars more popular in Middle East, North Africa
china.org.cn - Dec 26, 2007
Chery Automobile Co. , one of the biggest home-grown car makers in China, began to sell its car in Jordan about three years ago. And by now, Chery has sold more than 3,000 units in this Arab nation, said Moutaz al-Shaweish, sales manager of the franchise store set up by Chery Jordan Company Ltd. Such sales volume was quite satisfactory given the fact that Chery, as a newcomer in the world’s fiercely-competitive auto industry, was totally unknown in the Jordanian car market several years ago, said al-Shaweish. ”Actually, we were (then) facing many difficulties to convince consumers to buy our cars when they were offered for the first time in the market,” al-Shaweish recalled. But now, “we are not facing such difficulties as Chery is growing stronger and more competitive.
Bordow: ASU would like to emulate Texas
East Valley Tribune - Dec 26, 2007